Insurgents who overthrew the Syrian authorities stated Tuesday that they’ve wrested management of the jap metropolis of Deir Ezzor after intense battles with a Kurdish-led, US-backed power.
Hassan Abdul-Ghani, a senior commander of the jihadi group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which leads the rebel alliance, stated that the insurgent forces utterly took management of the town.
A member of HTS stated in a recorded video that the group would quickly conduct an intensive sweep of the town’s neighborhoods to safe the world, including that the strategic close by city of Boukamal has additionally fallen to opposition forces.
“We will advance towards Raqqa and Hasakah and different areas in jap Syria,” the HTS fighters stated.
The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces had solely held the town for a couple of days. The SDF stated it deployed to Deir Ezzor and west of the Euphrates River on Friday, changing Syrian authorities forces.
At the time, the SDF stated its fighters weren’t accountable for the Boukamal border crossing with Iraq, which Israel has struck quite a few occasions through the years to thwart arms transfers to Iran-linked teams.
Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) commander-in-chief Mazloum Abdi, speaks throughout a press convention in Syria’s northeastern metropolis of Hasakeh on December 6, 2024. (Delil Souleiman/AFP)
The Assad regime, which fell on Sunday after a lightning offensive by insurgent forces, was an ally of the Iranian regime, and part of its so-called Axis of Resistance towards Israel.
For a few years, Syria was used as a throughway for Iranian weapons, en path to terror teams together with Hezbollah in Lebanon, with which Israel entered a shaky ceasefire final month.
Following the regime’s fall, Israel moved to destroy regime weapons websites earlier than they might fall into the palms of forces hostile to the nation, with the navy estimating Tuesday it had destroyed some 70-80 % of the previous regime’s strategic navy capabilities.
Earlier Tuesday, high US navy commander for the Middle East Gen. Erik Kurilla visited with US navy commanders and troops in addition to the SDF.
It wasn’t clear if he met with SDF chief Mazloum Abdi, and US Central Command didn’t reply to a request for particulars about his go to or with whom he met. US officers stated they didn’t know what his message to the SDF was.
The US has about 900 troops in Syria, together with forces working with Kurdish allies within the northeast to stop any resurgence of the Islamic State group.
In a press launch, Central Command stated Kurilla acquired an “evaluation of power safety measures, the quickly evolving scenario, and ongoing efforts to stop ISIS from exploiting the present scenario.”
Kurilla then went on to Iraq, the place he met with leaders in Baghdad.
This handout picture made accessible by the Telegram channel of the official Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) exhibits Syria’s new transitional prime minister Mohammad al-Bashir chairing a gathering of the brand new cupboard in Damascus on December 10, 2024. (Stringer/SANA/AFP)
The caretaker Syrian authorities, which can oversee the nation’s affairs till March, held its first assembly Tuesday since overthrowing Assad.
It was attended by the departing Prime Minister Mohammad Ghazi Jalali and different ministers together with new Prime Minister Mohammed al-Bashir. He had led the so-called “salvation authorities” in areas managed by HTS-led insurgent teams which have taken management of a lot of the nation.
“We have been tasked by the final command with managing the affairs of the Syrian authorities throughout a transitional interval,” Bashir stated in a press release following the assembly in Damascus. He added that he hopes ministers within the former Syrian authorities will help the brand new authorities throughout this transitional interval.
“The caretaker authorities was shaped from a lot of ministers of the revolutionary authorities, which is the Syrian Salvation Government, and this authorities is a brief caretaker authorities that can final till March 2025, till the constitutional points are resolved,” Bashir stated.
